Best Practices Awards Recognize Excellence in Clinical IT

By Clinical Informatics News Staff

February 6, 2014 | The winners of Clinical Informatics News’ first annual Best Practices Awards were announced this morning at the 2014 Summit for Clinical Ops Executives in Miami. Three prizes were awarded at a presentation hosted by Allison Proffitt, editor of Clinical Informatics News, and Naila Ganatra of Barnett International, recognizing organizations’ outstanding use of information technology to improve patient service, clinical operations, or clinical trial management.

In the category of “Patient Data Management,” Mytrus and Pfizer received a joint award for a complete direct-to-patient clinical trial system, codenamed “Apollo.” This technology empowered patients in an OAB trial to participate from home, from recruitment and informed consent, to regular reporting of clinical data. The system also enabled the delivery of study data direct to participants upon the trial’s conclusion.

In the category of “Study Startup and Design,” Clinical Ink received an award for their SureSource platform, a tablet-based system that allows onsite capturing and reporting of clinical trial data in regions remote from city centers. The platform, which mimics the look and feel of paper forms to improve ease of use while providing real-time data validation, was used in a tuberculosis vaccine trial in sites across Tanzania and South Africa, connecting far-flung sites with limited connectivity and clinical trial resources to academic centers where data could be reviewed and interpreted.

In the category of “Clinical Data Intelligence,” Forte Research Systems received an award for establishing the Research Resonance Network, a portal for research sites to track and compare key metrics of performance. Participating sites upload data on metrics like cycle time in various stages of the research pipeline, or study volumes, and can compare their own performance to an anonymized average of their peers.

Clinical Informatics News will offer more information on the winners and other distinguished entrants in upcoming features.

Judges, including industry experts and members of the Clinical Informatics News editorial staff, reviewed many deserving entries, considering factors like industry impact, innovative use of technology, and effort to tackle areas with large unmet need for new solutions. Said Proffitt, “Our first year’s entries covered a range of areas and truly represented some of the best practices in the industry. Our judges had some tough decisions to make, and we believe that the contest has highlighted some truly innovative, game-changing tools and solutions.”